Operation Orion - Kevin Dockery [110]
Grafton braced his feet between the rungs of a ladder and shot another series of controlled bursts, remembering to aim after each three-round series. Another one of his men went down, nearly cut in half by the blast of a plasma ray, and Roberts squeezed off another beam from his ray gun, the fiery energy beam tearing through the torso of the shooter. Unlike the impact of bullets, the ray didn’t push the target or the shooter away, but it rendered him just as dead as a bullet to the brain.
There were just too many of the sons of bitches. A third sailor grunted and died, blood seeping out of the holes in the front and back of his suit as he was punctured by an extended burst. More rounds spattered against the metal hull beside Grafton’s head, and he shot reflexively, almost surprised as his hasty burst caught the Eluoi full in the chest. The hostiles were floating to all sides now, and the coxswain saw Roberts rise up, sweeping the beam of his ray gun through the attackers, hitting at least three of them.
Many of the survivors turned toward the shooter, and Grafton sprang from his ladder, grabbing Roberts by the arm. He pulled the young sailor behind a hull bulwark as the rounds zinged and ricocheted from the metal barrier.
“In here, son,” Grafton said, realizing that they were right at the door to an open storage locker. The two sailors ducked inside as another barrage of rounds spattered home. The locker was large enough to hold the two of them, giving each one some shelter beside the entrance. Each ducked to one side of the hatch, leaning out to return fire and then pulling back to avoid the enemy’s shots.
But there was no denying the fact that they were utterly, hopelessly trapped.
Sanders left Keast, Marannis, and Sanchez to control the bridge while he led his remaining seven men into the lift of the central transport shaft. The car zoomed quickly, and in twenty seconds the eight SEALS emerged into the grand ballroom, the large open compartment in the very middle of the ship. They burst from the car as soon as the door opened, carbines at the ready, but the compartment that previously had been occupied by two dozen armed Eluoi was empty.
“There’s the hatch, sir,” Dobson declared, pointing to the large access door connecting the gallery and ballroom to the shuttle docking bay. Even from twenty meters away they could hear shots banging off the superstructure of the hull and see the smoke of the firefight that drifted through the entryway.
“Let’s move!” Sanders barked, quickly activating his maneuver jets. The other SEALS followed suit, and in moments they burst through the hatch into the docking bay.
The officer’s first impression was that the carnage had been terrible. Dozens of bodies, many of them trailing blood that still trickled into the weightless atmosphere, drifted here and there. Some wore the white uniforms of the Eluoi soldiers, but all too many wore dark blue U.S. Navy pressure suits.
But there were survivors on both sides. The Eluoi had trapped the surviving sailors in the air lock of the shuttle and closed in from three dimensions, moving around the flanks and along the upper and lower surfaces of the hull. Many bulwarks and supporting brackets gave them cover from Wesling’s people, who were putting up a snappy fight.
The Eluoi never saw the SEALS coming up behind them. Immediately the Teammates started shooting, picking targets, hitting them with the recoilless rounds, and moving on. The hostiles, protected by their cover from the sailors, were completely exposed to the attackers coming at them from behind. In seconds, the last of the enemy had been dispatched, their bodies added to the floating graveyard of the docking bay.
Only at the rear of the bay did the firing continue, as Sanders saw that a couple of men had sought shelter in a storage locker and were holding a half dozen